


Just A Glance Away

by calmlikesurrender



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Anniversary, Dancing, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-08
Updated: 2013-01-08
Packaged: 2017-11-24 03:34:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/629916
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/calmlikesurrender/pseuds/calmlikesurrender
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt- "can you do narry’s first dance together. this is really terrible because im not giving you much detail about what to put in it but i just want it really fluffy and cute and its not at a prom or anything like that just maybe in their living room or kitchen or something and they’re dancing to the radio? please and thank you! :)"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just A Glance Away

Honestly, it’s the most embarrassed he’s ever been. Ignoring, of course, that never-to-be-mentioned-again night in Australia. There had been alcohol involved then so the blame for who fondled who first wasn’t wholly his, but this somehow seems worse. Without even a swallow of the wine he’d set out for the evening in his stomach, Niall’s hyperaware of that acrid stench.

            Still laced with the sweet undertones of apples and cinnamon, brown sugar-  _Can scents be mocking?-_  he pinches his nose and grabs the pan from the stove, flames and all, and dunks it into the sink. With a cackling hiss and roar, it finally consents to dying, but not before the kitchen reeks of the decaying remains of his attempt at a romantic evening. The tiny kitchen is cloudy with smoke and he can feel his eyes start to water.

            And just then, because he’s jinxed or something, Harry’s voice carries over from the front door. The familiar jingle of keys, the rustle of paper bags.

            “Hey, I’m home!” then after a few footsteps, “What’s that  _smell_?”

            Niall sighs, feeling the heat on his cheeks, knowing he’s probably the color of a tomato right now. He never should have tried- Harry does all of the cooking. It’s an unspoken rule. He’d just- well, he was feeling all romantic and  _fuck_  if he’s going to listen to his heart over his gut ever again. He pokes his head out of the doorway and smiles to Harry like he has everything completely under control.

            “It’s dinner,” he says, frowning when Harry starts to make his way over.

            “Aren’t you tired? Maybe you should go shower? Change?” Still, Harry’s smiling and trudging forward. He stops just long enough to drop his bags.

            “Can’t I kiss my boyfriend first?” he says, shaking his head.

            And, as if Niall needed another reason to love him, Harry doesn’t even blink when he eyes the carnage that is their kitchen. The dishes splayed around everywhere. Flour caked on the counters, saucy handprints on the fridge and even a few on the floor somehow. The pan still smoking in the sink.

            He pulls Niall in for a kiss, smelling every bit like Niall remembers he had when he’d crawled out of bed that morning. Like  _Harry_ \- he concedes to embrace the sap on this point alone- like warmth and musk and the cooingly sweet apple shampoo he uses. He could get lost in this kiss, like all the others, after only a moment but Harry pulls back a little. Watches him until they both smile, all giddy like they used to be in the beginning. When it was all new and Harry had asked him he’d wanted to go for a swim and Niall had snuck a kiss in the dark. They’d both blushed, but then another and another. Until their fingers and toes were pruning and wrinkly in the cold water and they’d gone to their beds, neither able to sleep. It was like that, with Harry’s hands on his waist and the kitchen reduced to a battle zone.

            “I had a long day,” Harry mutters, pulling him close until Niall’s face is buried into the crook of his neck.

            Niall scoffs, a barking laugh, “Yeah, shopping can really tire you out.”

            “Hey, it  _can_ ,” he shoots back, “Especially when there are hundreds of girls trying to figure out what you’re buying.”

            Niall has to almost bite his tongue off not to interject his own troubling day. Not that he feels he should have to. What with the evidence sprawled out about them.

            “What did you buy?” he says instead and Harry smiles, turning to leave, coming back in with his bags. One’s much larger than the others and he has to make room for it on the messy counter, pushing aside empty bowls and spoons and knives.

            “Turn around,” he says and Niall does.

            After a few quick snips like him cutting through cardboard, there’s the rustling of plastic. Niall scrunches his eyebrows up, trying to guess what it is.

            “What are we eating?” Harry says just then like he knows he’s trying to figure out what’s going on behind him. Then, with a smile Niall can practically hear in his voice, “It smells delicious.”

            “Well, it was supposed to be chicken parmesan,” Niall says, starting to feel impatient with waiting, tapping his foot, “but I forgot to thaw out the chicken so it was just the parmesan part. Then I burned it.”

            Harry laughs, “Oh. What’s this on the stove then?”

            Niall almost turns his head to see. Harry’s loud growl of protest stops him short.

            “That’s broccoli.”

            There’s a long pause, the sound of the bags rustling again, a lighter.

            Harry breathes out heavily, “Uhm, baby, it’s  _black_.”

            “I got distracted, so I sort of burned that, too.”

            “What distracted you so much you burned something steaming?”

            Niall has to stop himself from turning around again.

            “Steaming?”

            Harry laughs, then there’s the sound of the lighter again.

            “Yeah, you know you just put a little water at the bottom and it’s done in a few minutes.”

            “You don’t just put it in the pan?”

            Harry laughs again and Niall’s happy  _someone’s_  having a good time with all this.

            “I love you, you know?”

            “Even if I can’t cook for shit?”

            “You make up for it,” he says and then there’s the lighter again, three times, then the unmistakable sound of something being tossed away.

           “Alright,” Harry says, voice oddly subdued all of a sudden, turning the lights off so the kitchen’s bathed in gold, flickering light, “Turn around.”

            Niall’s not really sure what he expects, but it’s certainly not what’s there. On the counter, amidst the sticky remains of every edible thing in their kitchen, is a shiny black radio, each speaker lined in dark blue.

            Around it are a dozen misshapen candles, purple and white and grey, and right on top of the radio is a little cupcake, a single candle lit on top.

            “Harry…” his voice trails off and Harry thankfully reaches for him, holds him close.

            “Happy Birthday,” he says into his hair and Niall laughs.

            “You bought me a radio?”

            “And candles,” Harry adds quickly, squeezing him a little tighter.

            “I honestly thought you were going to buy me that new guitar.”

            “Liam,” Harry says, holding him back so he can look in his eyes.

            Niall smiles, “The shoes?”

            “Zayn,” Harry shakes his head, “and enough weed to last you until Christmas.”

            “Louis?” he asks and Harry looks a little upset.

            “I’ll just let you wait for that one, yeah?”

—

            He tries to apologize, but instead a laugh spills out and then they’re both heaving out shaky breaths, their eyes watering. He crawls over to Harry on the living room floor, avoiding the little take out boxes splayed out around them, and dabs at Harry’s half-soaked shirt with a napkin.

            “That’s not exactly helping,” he mutters, and Niall just nods. There wasn’t much they could do for it really. His favorite shirt was now splotched with dark purple where his wine had toppled over onto him.

            It was sort of Niall’s fault. But he’ll blame Harry because he wouldn’t have jerked his foot out if Harry hadn’t been threatening to tickle him.

            Harry glares at him and he glares back. Then they’re laughing again and Harry pulls him in for a quick, rough kiss, tasting like Thai food and wine and he settles back a bit, his back against the sofa, letting Niall climb up into his lap. Shift the angle to press their foreheads together, heavy breaths between the two of them.

            “It’s okay, right?” Harry says finally and Niall sighs.

            “I love it,” the radio, the candles, whatever. All of it. It’s  _you_ , idiot.  _Of course I love it_.

            But Harry always needs this quick affirmation. Sometimes he’s right there with it and Niall reassures him without pausing to question it. Other times Niall has to read the questions from his lips, the grip of his hands. Sometimes he’s not even sure what Harry’s asking for, he just gives. No questions asked.

—

            “You know I don’t dance,” he mutters.

            “Me either,” Harry says, with his hand out to help Niall up off the floor.

            For nearly the entire first few songs, he’s too focused on not tripping over his own feet, to actually enjoy it. Harry, too, is doing a terrible job of staying steady. All the while, though, there’s a goofy grin on his face. He tugs Niall closer and, with a bit of a duck wobble, leads them over to the radio again. He fiddles with the dial for a minute, but there’s still the static and when the woman’s voice fades away, the station changes on its own like it had before. Sometimes just as the song is beginning. Sometimes right in the middle, cutting off a low croon and Harry almost turns it off until Niall reaches for his hand.

            “Don’t,” he says low when a man’s voice fills the kitchen, a delicate, almost feminine, sound that’s not so bad. It’s slower than the first song and he puts his arms around Harry’s neck and they just sway like that, so close, until the song’s almost over. Then again the station changes on its own. This time though they both laugh, almost childishly excited to see what song is next.

            “Thanks for the gift,” Niall says teasingly, with a gentle kiss, and Harry groans.

            “Sorry I can’t figure it out. It  _would_  be just my luck I buy the one radio in the shop that doesn’t have English directions.”

            Niall’s almost ready to make a joke when the low sound of static fills the kitchen. It’s dark for a second until Frank Sinatra’s familiar voice fills in the empty spaces.  _I get no kick from_  the cackling static. Horns and  _mere alcohol_  and Harry’s hands tighten around his waist and again, they manage something more wobble than dance, bursting into laughter whenever they step on each other’s toes or try and sing the words only to be met with a long static pause. Eventually it’s Harry just humming along into his ear and then there’s a soft pause where the static dies and the station changes and Frank Sinatra’s voice fills the kitchen again. This time without the static.  _Love was just a glance away._

            And, okay, he’d never tell Harry this and risk his sanity being questioned, but there’s something so beautiful about the music and the bitterness, and Harry stepping on his shoes. It’s just so honest. With all of the hiccups. Like if he’d managed a miracle and sautéed the apples perfectly and Harry had never spilled his wine and they could actually figure out how to work the radio? It wouldn’t be as amazing as this- this awkward shuffling and dizzy smiles and half-eaten takeout. Harry’s big hand on his lower back like an anchor and Frank Sinatra’s voice making smooth trails through the static.

            So when Harry kisses him and he melts into a puddle on the floor, everything stills and when Harry says  _I love you_ between kisses, it’s the same shade of purple as the dribbles of wine down his white shirt and when he says it back there’s so much reverence he’s not sure where Harry ends and he starts or if it even matters when there’s  _forever_ sewn into the space between his ribs and  _forever_ in the warm press of his lips and  _forever and ever and ever_  between every sigh and every moan and if his eyes tear up it must be how spicy the noodles were and if Harry’s seem glossy too, if he rubs at them with the back of his hand, smiling so hard, biting into his lip, then it’s that word and everything that comes with it and how fearlessly they crash into it, chests aching, low whispers in the dark, trembling fingertips.


End file.
